Project Eternity - Social Round-up #2

May 24th, 2013, 06:05

Gamebanshee has more info on Project Eternity gathered from various social websites. Here is a little snip as it would be impossible to post eveything.

So, Project Eternity will have a unified inventory for all party members, as opposed to the Infinity Engine games' per-character inventory. That doesn't bother me so much, but what's your opinion of per-character inventories? You don't like them?

In a game where one player controls all party members, I don't think it adds anything to the game to split gear up across 6 screens. There's no mental challenge to the process of organizing items across the screens. It's just busywork.

If each companion has different encumbrance thresholds, it's not as simple as just splitting the inventory..There's also a roleplaying factor involved.

"This is my strong fighter, he carries the heavy stuff. This is my mage, he carries all the scrolls."

You could accomplish the same thing by color-coding a single grid to represent what parts are carried by what character. In practice, people playing IE games just drag items onto any available slot until a limit is hit, then drag it to someone else.
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What limits will be imposed upon inventory? Weight? Size of items? Slot size? Will we see weak elf stuffed with 100 full plates of feather weight? Or party of barbarians and paladins with inventroy filled with 100 slots of beans?

In the current design, party Stash size (withdrawals only available at rest locations) is unlimited. Worn Equipment is slot-based and is the same for all characters (barring abilities or talents that do things like increase available weapon sets). The one area we haven't decided on in terms of capacity is the shared Pack, which is gear that is not actively worn but available for access outside of combat. However it is defined, it will always be displayed as a unified UI for the player so they aren't flipping between characters for what is, practically-speaking, a shared inventory.

I'm a big believer in having a simple pooled inventory, but only allowing access to a couple of small quickslot items in combat - and not allowing equipment changes - you've got two potions on your belt (or a potion and a trap, or a trap and an alternative weapon) and everything else is packed up in the invisible packmule's saddlebags.

In a game where one player controls all party members, I don't think it adds anything to the game to split gear up across 6 screens.

Of course it does. It adds the ability to logically sort items according to the character that will be using them. The only way this unified inventory can work well is if players never have to actually USE IT for anything. If they're just going to do a check to see if the player has item_x and then make use of it automatically then that's not really an inventory at all, is it? It's a graphical listbox. Which is better than what ME2 did, but not by much. Edit: I'm guessing they've got XCOM inventory in mind, not ME2.

There's no mental challenge to the process of organizing items across the screens. It's just busywork.

That "busy work" adds to suspension of disbelief, which last I checked was a pretty critical, not just in RPGs and not even just in games but in any sort of fictional narrative.

What I'm wondering is what they gain by this unified inventory. Implementing it per character instead of only once globally is a trivial bit of coding and considering the downsides, not least of which is the unnecessary confusion players, especially the more anal-retentive ones, will feel, it doesn't seem like a move they would have made for no reason.

Anyway, be that as it may, I'm looking forward to this game a lot. However, I just realized while perusing that link after not having played any D&D based games in quite some time how silly and gratuitously complicated the 3.5 and etc rules for that game system seem to me now. Too many gimmicks by far. I miss my old D&D. I miss inventory systems, too. I suppose in a year or two there won't even be player characters anymore, we'll just have a little customizable bot script that does everything for us while we sit there slobbering on our keyboards. Which will be great for tablets since they don't have keyboards and people generally use them while they are supposedly doing something else, anyway.

most of that info was available on the official forums, especially the huge chunk about monks. Which is good, since I don't feel like hunting down JES posts across the net (in particular I don't feel like frequenting Neogaf or Reddit).

I prefer the unlimited inventory of Gothic over the limited one in Elder Scrolls. Doing a lot of running back and forth between dungeons and vendors is no fun at all. I like to move back into town when I have an actual reason to do so, not just to clear my inventory.

That being said, inventory wasn't a massive issue in most Infinity Engine games, as I usually have 1-3 very strong characters. It's mostly an issue when soloing.

Edit: As for the "realism" of limited inventory - I have never seen a limited inventory that was realistic. Realistic means you could only drag around the armor you're wearing + a few weapons + a few provisions. That's about it unless you have a pack mule or similar.

I like a bit of realism, I also like the practicality of a shared inventory. I think, the best for me would be a shared inventory in which you can 'assign' items to characters. So, when buying/selling you have it all together, but during combat, characters can only use what's assigned to them.

How they should do inventory is have a pack mule which would be the inventory while the characters would have equipment and a few other things like an extra weapon and some healing items. A pack mule can be brought into a dungeon so characters can get things from the pack mule but if they do during combat there would be a combat penalty. Since each character would want their own area of the pack mule for their stuff the items should be able to be assigned by character and then you can set what items are viewed by character along with other viewing and sorting options. The pack mule can be upgraded to increase the maximum amount of storage in different ways from the bags to the mule itself which very likely will cost a good deal of money.

I'd like to see them implement an open-ended Pack size, rather than giving it a cap. If they implement party penalties based on the combined mass of the Pack and the strength of the party members (such as penalties to initiative and stealth), then the player has an incentive both to spend build points on character strength and to keep the Pack compact and light.

This is another disappointing decision for me. I remember several times in the IE games when I'd want to give a potion, scroll or weapon to another player but they were to far away. That lead to additional decisions or pre planning that needed to be done, which is a good thing IMO.

The other, way more important disappointment to me is the monk. To me monks are unarmed combatants that specialize in avoiding damage. Having to let my monk get hit so I can use special abilities just sounds terrible to me. I play a monk in every game I have to option to, so this really puts a damper on this game for me. Soaking up damage so you can go into some kind of rage sounds like a barbarian to me. Pretty much the opposite of what I think a monk is.

They can use any weapon or armor so I can play it the way I want too? Well I want to play my monk as an unarmed stealth specialist that strikes fast and is gone before they can take too much damage. Doesn't sound like I can play my monk that way.

I too am a fan of the Gothic style inventory, so this is a move in the right direction. I find inventory juggling tedious and boring. But I do like giving (and putting in their inventory) party members the items they will most likely be using. I'd prefer unlimitted inventory for each member ala Gothic.

Originally Posted by guenthar
How they should do inventory is have a pack mule which would be the inventory while the characters would have equipment and a few other things like an extra weapon and some healing items. A pack mule can be brought into a dungeon so characters can get things from the pack mule but if they do during combat there would be a combat penalty. Since each character would want their own area of the pack mule for their stuff the items should be able to be assigned by character and then you can set what items are viewed by character along with other viewing and sorting options. The pack mule can be upgraded to increase the maximum amount of storage in different ways from the bags to the mule itself which very likely will cost a good deal of money.

Another part to what I said above is that a character wouldn't have access to the mule if they are too far from the mule and any penalties would be based on the distance from the mule and what you are taking.

Originally Posted by sakichop
The other, way more important disappointment to me is the monk. To me monks are unarmed combatants that specialize in avoiding damage. Having to let my monk get hit so I can use special abilities just sounds terrible to me. I play a monk in every game I have to option to, so this really puts a damper on this game for me. Soaking up damage so you can go into some kind of rage sounds like a barbarian to me. Pretty much the opposite of what I think a monk is.

They can use any weapon or armor so I can play it the way I want too? Well I want to play my monk as an unarmed stealth specialist that strikes fast and is gone before they can take too much damage. Doesn't sound like I can play my monk that way.

Well a big chunk of the damage to the Monk does get through; you're not invulnerable and you're still better off to avoid getting hit. The special abilities function like a second wind, putting you back in the fight with a retaliatory strike after you've been beat up. That doesn't seem entirely incompatible with the Monk archetype. It just lets you hold up better against armored foes.

I like a backpack for each character with a penalty (time/action points) for accessing the pack in combat. Items once retrieved from the pack can be passed among the party but that also incurs a time penalty. A additional shared inventory is also good if it makes sense, i.e. if the players own a cart/boat/stronghold - but the shared space can also be accessed when in that area. I also like items that extend character slots i.e. a belt with 2 weapon slots or a quiver - these more accessible slots could possibly have no/small penalty for equiping.